600.0012/12–2954
Memorandum of Conversation, by Howard Meyers of the Office of United Nations Political and Security Affairs1
- Subject:
- Review of United States Policy on Control of Armaments
- Participants:
- The Secretary
- Mr. Murphy, G
- Mr. MacArthur, C
- Mr. Merchant, EUR
- Mr. Barbour, EUR
- Mr. Key, IO
- Mr. Bowie, S/P
- Mr. Stelle, S/P
- Mr. Gerard Smith, S/AE
- Howard Meyers, UNP
The Secretary suggested that the key question in considering this subject was whether it was possible to have elimination of nuclear weapons without a corresponding reduction in the conventional armaments field. He thought it might be possible to work out effective controls in the nuclear field, but that it was not really feasible to control conventional weapons because this involved so many complicated items and because there was such great opportunity for evasion of agreements in the conventional field. The practical effect of insisting that there could be no limitations in the nuclear field without limitations in the conventional field meant that there might well not be disarmament, unless there should be a mutual de facto disarmament by both sides individually cutting down their armaments and armed forces. Thus far, the United States retained superiority in the nuclear field. Although there was a danger of under-rating the Soviets, the Secretary believed that the U.S. should be able to maintain this superiority even in the future. Thus, if the U.S. should agree to eliminate nuclear weapons alone, we would be depriving ourself of those weapons in which the U.S. was ahead and would not be taking action in the area of Soviet superiority, the conventional armaments field. This created an obvious danger to the United States. On the other hand, it could be argued that atomic weapons are the only ones by which the U.S. can be virtually destroyed through a sudden attack, and if this [Page 1586] danger of destruction should be removed by eliminating nuclear weapons this would help the U.S. by enabling retention intact of our industrial power which has acted both as a deterrent against total war and as a principal means of winning a war.
Mr. Bowie said that the Department of Defense position on this review of basic disarmament policy2 had raised a question which preceded the key question noted by the Secretary. This was that Defense believed any form of disarmament was contrary to U.S. security interests, principally because we could not trust the Soviets, who would violate any agreement.
The Secretary observed that in the conventional field, at least, there were so many areas to be covered that no plan could insure against all violations, and that in large measure the protection against violations of an international agreement involved the existence of such trust between nations that in fact there would be no need for a disarmament agreement. He thought that there was little difference between his views and those of the Defense Department, since he believed it would be impossible to insure absolutely that a disarmament program would be in our security interest. However, this came down to a question of the kind of risks we were willing to assume, and he believed that the real issue was how to maintain intact our industrial potential.
Mr. Bowie believed that the basic problem is how to remove the atomic threat to U.S. security, which had approached the point where failure to get disarmament now constituted a threat to U.S. security. He would be happy if an agreement could be reached which would cut down conventional armaments as well as nuclear, but this appeared to be too complicated a problem. The approach which seemed to offer the most promise was to take a little segment of the disarmament problem (cessation of nuclear fuel production) and see whether agreement could be reached with the Soviets on this objective, which would require simpler and more easily enforceable safeguards.
Mr. Murphy observed that it was not easy to separate the nuclear and conventional aspects of disarmament, because of the intermingling of both nuclear and conventional weapons systems and the fact that the means for delivering nuclear weapons involved conventional armaments, such as aircraft, artillery, etc.
The Secretary, in this connection, referred to the benefits given us by the existence of bases surrounding the Soviet Union, which enable us to deliver nuclear attack over such a wide area that it would be difficult for the Soviets to prevent an attack from being [Page 1587] delivered on target. On the other hand, the Soviets could only hit the continental U.S. from one area, the North, which should make it easier for us to stop a good portion of a Soviet nuclear attack.
Mr. Bowie said that this did not take account of the fact that the Soviets within a fairly short time should be able to use submarine attacks against the American continent through firing guided missiles with nuclear warheads, and that before too many years the Soviets would probably have intercontinental ballistic missiles which could press home such attacks and would be fired from Soviet territory.
Mr. Meyers noted that one factor which had not been brought out in the discussion was that it was generally agreed that it was not possible to account fully for past production of nuclear materials, involving militarily significant amounts. This meant that it would be impossible to eliminate nuclear weapons, since we could not be sure that the Soviets would not hold out a sufficient amount of nuclear material (which could not be accounted for) so that they might launch a surprise attack. If we had agreed to eliminate all nuclear weapons we could not retaliate against such surprise attack, nor could we deter this attack by a nuclear capability in readiness. This factor seemed to indicate that an acceptable disarmament program had to link conventional and nuclear reduction. In part, this was required because we could not afford to reduce our nuclear stockpiles unless the Soviets reduced the conventional armaments in which they had superiority. In part, this linkage seemed required because, as Mr. Murphy had previously pointed out, the means of delivering nuclear weapons involved conventional armaments, and it certainly would be necessary to cut down delivery capabilities if we were to cut down our nuclear capabilities.
Mr. Bowie agreed that the impossibility of assuring the elimination of nuclear weapons at least led to the need to reduce the means of delivering these weapons. He emphasized the necessity for the U.S. to carry out a strenuous effort toward disarmament in all sincerity. The proposal which he had advanced was based on: (a) the fact that the effectiveness of an inspection system depends on experience gained in the operation of such system, since this is such an unexplored area; (b) the fact that increasing nuclear inventories increased the difficulty of inspection to verify what had happened to this nuclear material. This led him to believe that much could be said for minimizing this problem by stopping the production of all nuclear fuels, if this can be done without danger to our security.
Mr. Murphy referred to a suggestion previously made by Mr. Smith (S/AE) that the United States should conduct a trial run of an inspection system to see what were the difficulties.
[Page 1588]The Secretary remarked on the great difficulty of securing competent personnel to check on the enforcement of any disarmament program. This was the reason why the Baruch Plan had proposed that the international control organ should run all nuclear plants, so that policing would follow automatically from the management operation.
Mr. Meyers explained that there was general agreement in the Department that cessation of nuclear fuel production within the next few years would be in U.S. security interests if protected by adequate safeguards. Disagreement with Mr. Bowie’s views arose from the question of how to put forward such a proposal, since no other area in the Department concerned with this problem believed it would be politically advisable to make this suggestion except as part of proposals for reductions of nuclear and conventional armaments. There were two reasons for this view: (a) stopping nuclear fuel production at this time obviously favored the U.S. by freezing our nuclear superiority so that the Soviets would be bound to propose reductions in stockpiles or an unconditional ban on the use of all nuclear weapons, and this in turn would lead us to insist on reductions in the conventional field in which the Soviets had superiority; (b) it was doubtful that a proposal limited as Mr. Bowie suggested would be acceptable to certain of our principal allies, notably the United Kingdom, because they would not have adequate nuclear stockpiles for military or peaceful purposes. There was also considerable disagreement with Mr. Bowie’s plan because of the safeguards he proposed and the stages he suggested for reaching this goal.
The Secretary believed that this was the kind of a problem which fundamentally could not be solved by controls or by limiting weapons. Once weapons of great power had been discovered, it seemed most doubtful that they could be eliminated. In fact, there would seem to be more chance of success if one could eliminate war.
Mr. Murphy directed the Secretary’s attention to the memorandum which he had just laid before the Secretary, and which was agreed to by all the interested areas in the Department. This proposed that the Secretary should ask the National Security Council to recommend that it is important for the United States to continue efforts to achieve safeguarded disarmament, as politically necessary and in U.S. security interests; that the review of basic disarmament policy should be continued and that the President should promptly appoint an outstanding person to direct this review and perhaps to represent the United States in the London disarmament discussions, which would commence in February.
The Secretary agreed that it would be advisable to bring in a man of outstanding qualifications, as suggested in the memorandum, [Page 1589] to head up this review. He believed that this required a decision by the Government, and not just by the State Department, and indicated that he would consider this matter further.